Opera & Arias at the Bard on the Beach Shakespeare Festival

It’s a marriage made in arts heaven: opera and Shakespeare. Add a gorgeous outdoor setting in Vanier Park, and you’ve got a pretty impressive night out. On the roster for the Bard on the Beach Shakespeare Festival’s Opera & Arias concerts this year are beloved works inspired by the playwright, including arias and ensembles from Romeo and Juliet, Hamlet, The Merry Wives of Windsor, and more, performed by the UBC Opera Ensemble and members of the Vancouver Opera Orchestra. The UBC School of Music’s Nancy Hermiston directs the in-concert staging, while conductor Leslie Dala takes the podium for the musicians. Concerts happen Monday (August 25) at 2 and 7:30 p.m. and September 1 at the same times, in Bard’s Mainstage Theatre tent in the waterfront park.